BOE Meeting (3 December 2020)

001on thursday december 3rd by our bylaws the first meeting in december includes an organizational meeting so it should be brief but we put that ahead of our regular agenda all right first item on the organizational meeting is the election of officers and by our bylaws we need to elect a chairman first are there nominations for chairman i nominate thank you okay are there any further nominations all right nominations are closed uh our bylaws require that we vote by ballot so if all board members could go to their email find the ballot that lucille sent and just text her on email it to her i'll give you a couple minutes thank you [Music] lucille did you get them yep i i've got three right now i'm just waiting for um i guess one more did we

002lose glenn when we let me see if he's in the waiting room um can you just uh send lucille an email yeah i'm trying to i don't i'm not quite sure how to do that i minimized my thing there okay so i'm gonna send that back uh which i think i did trying to at least if i text you when you text me your vote no i think i think you got it i hope you got it did you it should have come back hold on let me check yep i got it go ahead okay i've received all the votes um five votes for deborah lowe oh thank you thank you everyone deborah my apologies i don't know what happened i got shut out i went you everybody just it's okay i heard the count

003so okay thank you so much everybody okay all right um are there nominations for vice chairman i nominate glenn hemerly are there further nominations all right so we need to do this nominations are closed and if everyone could send their ballot to lucille for vice chairman all right i think i figured out how to do it yeah i've yes i've got you glenn i've got everybody so it's five votes for glenn all right thank you everybody and congratulations glenn thank you so much thank you are there nominations for secretary i nominate i'm sorry let me do it i'd like to nominate gretchen jeans now a second all right i don't think we need one but thanks all right so let's send that ballot in as well uh inbox did you get them loose seal one

004two three four one two three four five one two three four i think i'm missing one no i've got them all five five votes for okay great thank you everyone and congratulations gretchen okay we have the officers set um for the next year on to the consent agenda this includes appointment of legal counsel district medical advisor and designation of signatories is there a motion to approve the consent agenda thanks glenn is there a second second thanks gretchen all in favor aye aye any opposed all right sent agenda is approved and thanks jen for uh pointing out the earlier um typos though thank you meeting dates for the 2021 remaining school year meeting dates and again this does not preclude special meetings so um is there a motion to approve our meeting calendar still moved thanks

005gretchen is there a second second thanks glenn all in favor aye okay motion carries the next is approval of our 2021 committee assignments and liaison roles is there a motion to approve right thanks gretchen and thanks gwen all in favor aye aye any opposed motion carries all right the rest is informational procedures for efficient board meeting well sometimes we're okay and sometimes not so okay so we'll take it under advisement all right i'm going to adjourn the organizational meeting and call to order our regular thursday december 3rd board of education meeting um have people gotten a chance to review the agenda and if so is there a motion to approve so moved thanks glenn all in favor i'm sorry sir a second second thanks gretchen all in favor hi hi um lucille are there comments

006from the public that you received okay consent agenda is there a motion to approve the consent who did agenda i'm not sure who did that jumping around gretchen thank you is there a second second glenn all right all in favor hi hi motion carries um reports um it's been quiet so i have no board shares report except to thank everyone um for uh voting for the officers this year um so thanks for everyone's support really appreciate that it's an honor to serve superintendent great i have a i have a lengthy report so um buckle up there's a just a you know even in a short vacation week there's a lot to cover so um i'll try to proceed as quickly as i can i mean feel free to just interrupt with any uh questions um

007first i just want to inform the board this past tuesday we held a follow-up session with dr andrew gerber who is the president and medical director at silver hill hospital we had about 30 parent participants and dr gerber provided information and recommendations about monitoring the social and emotional well-being of children we'll have the video we recorded the session so the video will be on our website for uh any parents or other community members who would like to access it um i just thought i'd share just a couple of um dr gerber's chief insights um first you know he noted and we all know this that you know there are many who are struggling for many different reasons during this time and the um pandemic has the effect of amplifying those struggles and so you know

008consequently it's important that we check in and check in especially uh with our children and um you know within our children um especially if we have adolescent or um you know high school age kids um dr gerber also you know took the time to really reinforce that you know parents are the best experts when it comes to knowing and understanding their children and uh you know i thought he did a fine job in making the point that um as the first best experts they also should trust their instincts and you know as a father of five i took that um feedback very well and so um you know his point was you know you know your kids best and you know if you're seeing something if you're seeing a behavior change or if you think

009you know something is not quite right trust your instincts and if something is off it's probably so um you know don't hesitate to seek some support and that was kind of his laugh last you know kind of chief point and that was you know none of us should be uh afraid to seek support you know whether it's for ourselves or in service to our children because of the time we're in um we could all probably use a little extra support and there is no harm that could come of it so he really reinforced that message um you know we spent about an hour and there were a few questions from parents but like i said the session will be on the video and uh you know i want to thank kim zemo uh who you

010know has been you know working with some mental health providers here in the region was able to facilitate that and we'll continue to come together and just kind of monitor you know where we are as a community and continue to provide you know follow-up sessions and you know supports as we're able to so last night fran and go ahead glenn yep uh the survey work that kim is doing is dr gerber in tune with that or is he also part of that process or is he familiar with it or supportive of it um to be supportive of it um but he um has not been involved with that um as far as i'm aware we had a local group um you know make some recommendations okay thanks yeah um so you know switching gears uh

011but still in response to um you know some parental questions and needs um fran kompar and a team of our teachers um put together a session last night that was very very well received it was timely i heard some wonderful feedback the topic was you know schoology and supporting students at home and so i just want to take a moment and um thank fran fran you know like so many others has is one of our unsung heroes um through this pandemic um you know she is when people need something she reaches out and she responds immediately and you know always does a very very good job in responding to questions and needs and um you know last night was no surprise and no exception so fran i just want to um thank you on behalf

012of all those who participated the feedback that you know i took today was very very positive so thank you very much yeah i'd like to add i was with a parent of a uh middle brook student over the holidays and she raves about schoology nothing but good things to say about it about how well it works for her how happy she is with it it's just it's wonder she's wonderful she couldn't say enough good things about it so hopefully we're getting there with it hopefully our teachers are get coming i'm sure they are it's just question time but this parent was just effusive about it yeah it's nice to hear so yeah just like this session that fran put on last night is that um something that was recorded or available for a future um

013viewing yes we actually recorded and i wanted to um also thank um we had um you know dr o'donnell uh principal higgins a number of others that participated in it we recorded it and i'm going to post it on the home page where it says schoology support page so it'll be available to everyone great thank you so much great um so another just brief update um some of you uh or all of you may be aware that um you know one of our staff members mike gordon who works over at middlebrook has been leading some of the district's efforts to provide training and support to our staff as part of our efforts to promote diversity equity and inclusion yesterday our faculties across the district participated in a training session that was facilitated by two anti-racism

014trainers from uh crack crack is the capital region education council the training uh was about an hour in duration and focused on the developing of cultural competency in classrooms um that too was very very well received uh by staff across the district that had the opportunity to participate with the middlebrook staff and was really um you know taken with the content as well as the uh input and feedback from our two trainers i was appreciative of the thoughtful questions our staff have been asking and you know this is just you know kind of one more step in the long list of steps that you know we've been taking um in our own um self-education on these topics and so um you know following on that we'll have our next uh district equity and inclusion team

015meeting that'll take place on january 6th and we'll have an opportunity that team hasn't met in a while and so we'll have an opportunity just to kind of assess where we are assess the effectiveness of the steps we've taken so far just brainstorm and plan some next steps and i'll report to the board uh after you know that next meeting so also just before the thanksgiving break i participated in a conversation that was facilitated by uh genevieve isan and the conversation was with retired brigadier general dr steven zanakis who is an adult child and adolescent psychiatrist currently serving at silver hill hospital we had a number of folks from the community join that conversation including kim zemo sarah heath from wilton social services susan lorcella from the library cinda moser cindy moser from trackside denise

016quayley who works for kids in crisis the woman present tara reed from silver hill she runs the silver hill resilience campaign which i'll tell you about just a second and then uh cantor harriet dunkerley from uh temple benign and uh reverend reverend marissa rohrbach from saint matthews uh the purpose of that conversation was to bring together a small group of representatives from you know organizations within wilton and um brainstorm with dr zinakis some next steps in responding to you know questions and concerns about the welfare of our community members both in light of the pandemic but also in response to the tragedies experienced by our high school community and so kind of after listening to the update that we provided dr zanakis offered you know how he would likely respond if he was still in

017the military and what he proposed to us was this idea of a broad-based but simple campaign to raise awareness to check in with neighbors and also to provide opportunities for resiliency skill development so that idea really resonated with the group and um we're you know kind of thinking and planning and in the midst of kind of moving forward with that idea and so you know what we're talking about is launching this idea of a wilton community campaign for caring uh and you know the goals of that are you know fairly simple and straightforward you know number one we would invite you know every community organization to join and um as part of that just recommit their to the efforts you know that are already underway that they have to reach out and connect with their

018various memberships and constituencies um as part of that we would create a clearinghouse of resources uh and information about events and activities you know again to um you know promote awareness across the community and help um foster further connection um you know among every segment of our community and then um two we would also share and disseminate uh information and opportunities about some of those trainings and uh you know skill development activities tara reed who is leading the silver hill campaign for resiliency is leading that program and she's offered their services they run webinars many of them are free of charge and so we would be looking to access the work that they're doing and offering it to members of our community so uh we're in the kind of still the early portion of the

019um brainstorming phase and trying to organize this but i fully expect in the next several days week we can have we'll have good plans in place that i can then turn around and share with the board and we'll be disseminating uh this information and opportunity across the community and i would expect you know just knowing the wilton community will have a lot of interest in buy-in and support and you know i think it's an opportunity um to really do some good for you know everybody who lives here so i'm excited about it and looking forward to getting it off the ground all right so my last um kind of major update here so when we get to the learning model agenda item we'll talk you know quite a bit about you know cobit 19 activities

020um but i did want to update the board on two pieces you know one you probably read or heard yesterday the cdc revised their quarantine guideline recommendations um so if you look at the cdc website they're still saying first and foremost they recommend a 14-day quarantine but given some certain parameters in place communities and healthcare providers and municipalities can access and utilize shorter quarantine periods and you know what they're proposing is individuals who are you know symptom-free can quarantine for 10 days instead of 14 days without a without a covet test and that could be shortened even further to seven days if um individuals have no symptoms and get a negative result of a covet test so i spoke with barry bogle and chrissy mackin about that yesterday and barry's response you know everyone's aware

021of it and so he's waiting for um some directive from state level department of health folks and as soon as he gets that you know he'll let us know and then we can begin to um utilize that shortened quarantine period any questions about that okay great and so i just uh several updates on the covet testing front um first you also may be aware that the town is organizing a local cobit testing site once that's up and running and is in place we will go ahead and offer that opportunity to our staff um you know at least for the early part of it and so um that's you know the the district will cover the cost of that test for staff members who want to be tested once that is up and running for the

022first portion of the testing window i previously reported that we were working on a couple of options to take advantage of the availability of the binax now antigen rapid tests that are offered to school districts by the state these tests are intended to be utilized for students and staff members who are exhibiting symptoms dr mackin and her colleagues at doctors pediatric are going to serve as the provider for us for these tests she's presently working on the logistics but um is imagining we'll have that in place um fairly soon so um as soon as that's ready to go and we're ready to launch that i'll uh i'll alert the board the last yep go ahead the month or like sometime in january you know um i i'm not sure i think you know my sense

023is you know they had to do some training and you know there's some steps that they have to take to to get it set up but um you know i i didn't think that we were a long ways off um and so she you know we were in touch today briefly about it and you know i expect that um you know it'd be probably sooner rather than later yeah the the last kind of testing update i have for you um as you you you know uh debbie and i had a conversation some time ago with some folks from uh cicl cic health up in cambridge and uh one of the testing models that um they were proposing was this use of surveillance testing and so that's the idea of using testing whether it's pool testing

024or pcr testing to just monitor coveted spread in the community we were really interested in the pool testing options so i had a follow-up conversation this week with um one of the associates in that group named boris perlovsky and so he walked me through the logistics of pool testing and um you know three weeks ago when we were speaking to him and his colleague um it sounded you know fairly simple and straightforward and uh you know something that we could you know reasonably access um today after the last conversation um not so much you know not insurmountable by any stretch of the imagination but there are quite a few more hoops we have to jump through in order to take advantage of these so what boris reported and i'll send this to you so you

025can um you know read about it at your leisure so i'll just kind of summarize the conversation quickly here but essentially you know there are two labs that cic health works with one is down in memphis and the other is up in cambridge the memphis lab is the one that utilizes the matrix testing that we talked about and so the advantage of that approach it's still a pooled test but samples go into two separate pools so that way if you know one of those individual samples turns out to be positive the lab can identify the individual without having to do a follow-up pcr test so there were some real advantages to that model in order to take advantage of that model we have to do some things so we have to have a physician who

026would be willing to provide uh standing orders um so that way we can take advantage of those tests um and then we also have to have a provision for um reporting uh to the um state any positive cases um that's something that you know barry and his team at the local health department do right now so i had a conversation about this with both dr mackin and barry yesterday um dr mackin had suggested that um she might be able to provide those standing orders for us um there's a couple of questions i have to reach back and get answered um so we can kind of finalize that piece and then um with respect to reporting back to the state you know that is something you know working through barry we could probably work out but

027he also had um a short list of really good questions um that i need to follow up on and you know he was really curious to know you know more about the type of tests that they use as well as the the labs and are these labs approved by the connecticut state department of public health so i don't have an answer to that yet um but once i do then we'll be able to make a a final decision about whether um that would be the best direction for us to move in if we were going to pursue surveillance testing and the other caution that um boris offered to me in the conversation about that particular lab apparently the city of memphis has um a first right of priority agreement in place with that lab and

028so um what he said was you know like right now if we were able to take advantage of this you know we'd still be at or toward the front of the line uh but they're in some conversation with the city of memphis and if the city of memphis scales up its testing then you know we could get bumped to the back of the line and he was not clear in the conversation when we spoke about what that meant in terms of timing you know so right now um you know you do the testing here on site you box it up you fedex it to the lab and you know they um suggest that we'll get results back you know from within 24 hours of the time they receive the samples and so but with this

029um you know potential of the city of memphis you know having the first right of priority that could impact that so he was going to have more information about you know the feasibility and the guarantee of the timeline sometime around the first of the year so the so that was you know part a and i apologize i know it's a lot of information the other pool testing opportunity that this company uses is with broad labs and they don't do matrix testing at broad labs it's just straight sample testing and so what that means is you put samples together you test them as a single unit and if there is a positive case within that sample then all of the participants in that group have to get a follow-up test and so when we were first

030talking about that you know you know my takeaway was that could be cost prohibitive if we have to get a follow-up um you know pcr test because of the cost of pcr tests so in the conversation with um boris you know he wondered if the binax now antigen test that we do have access to could be a reasonable um proxy for a follow-up test so um i don't know the answer to that yet and that's a question that i'm going to put in front of some folks at the state department of public health because if it is if those are effective um it could be used for that purpose then from at least a cost perspective you know we'd be in a very good place and um you know cic has a good close relationship

031they're right there in the neighborhood um and the facilitating of testing and getting results and they have the capacity and they anticipate they'll continue to have capacity to take our samples and then turn them around and within 24 hours so um i think you know good kind of forward progress at least informationally a few more questions that need to be asked and answered and then you know we'll have a solid recommendation about how we want to proceed so happy to take any questions on that piece of it i can bore you with details about the process and testing and all of that well kevin clearly this is occupying a great deal of your time and effort and energy and certainly rightfully so i i just want to kind of i looked at the numbers that

032you uh stood out the other day at the grid with the schools the number of cases everything and it's amazing i we are so fortunate and so lucky that evidently we're doing a lot of the right things and particularly the high school i mean it's uh and kudos to everyone who's part of that process and everyone who's who's doing their job family students etc uh compared to many of the other districts around us we're we're doing fine and it's a credit to you and your staff and i i think to the custodians anyone and everybody who has a part in in trying to mitigate this uh deserves a pen on the back at this point who's gonna say what could happen going forward but as of now i think done i think you guys have

033done a remarkable job and uh congrats so far we could just keep it up i appreciate that thank you very much yeah kevin thanks for um all that extensive research um and yes we can only imagine how much time that's all taking and now we're gonna uh be adding the much more hope here of you know a possible vaccine so that will you know happily require uh more research and and perhaps you know obviously a light at the end of the tunnel for all of this yeah well another but another layer of planning and understanding its implications uh keeping on top of everything and also thanks for um you know so much for paying attention to um other crucial and important aspects going on in our district in terms of uh social emotional needs um

034so thank you for uh leadership there and we'll look forward to um uh further reports on the um equity uh work that's being done on the faculty end so thank you my vote would be after the front line healthcare workers the elderly the next in line with the vaccine would be teachers okay right right yeah yeah it'll it'll all be about the timing so but yes absolutely it um a lot of potential and hopefully happy um that all the all the best wishes in terms of timing work out um okay kevin i hate to keep you talking oh wait i guess we have committee reports i'm not sure if there were any committee meetings between our last meeting i don't think so okay kevin while you were doing all your work um i was watching

035christmas movies and eating too much turkey so not me okay we the ops committee did not meet we're scheduled for the next literacy okay great thanks okay um so kevin i hate to keep you talking but now it's time for your goals i think the whole agenda's mind for the most part here all right i'm going to share screen and i'll just walk you through a few slides uh and we can just go from there you might think i would have this down right um uh okay so you've seen this um before you know this document really captures uh you know the work that we had done over the last several years first in uh describing both a vision and a mission um as well naming our values promises and then describing and it's still

036very much in draft form because we didn't have the opportunity to complete it last year what we're calling our portrait of the graduate and i just i offer it to you tonight because the um the aspirations that are described here really are the bedrock and the foundation um from which we uh operate and we plan and we take our direction and so even in the midst of a global pandemic we still believe that you know it's our job to inspire and prepare all of our students uh to be meaningful contributors um to a globally interdependent society um and you know we also still believe that we need to be guided by expert rigorous instruction and have a curriculum that focuses on our learners um and create opportunities for our uh children to pursue their goals

037and aspirations uh in service to the broader community so i i um just offer that to you um you know to kind of anchor back to um you know these ideals that are um are important to us as an educational community um important to me personally um and as we talk about you know goals and next steps you know we ought to be able to point backwards to you know what we agreed on as our you know shared aspirations for our kids right and then you know along those same lines several years ago you know we had come to agreement about what are our you know big levers in terms of you know how we want to grow our practice in service uh to our kids and so you know the district adopted a couple

038of theories of action um and a theory of action is basically you know it answers the question how we're going to go about you know achieving our mission and our vision and so the thrust of our theories of action we're really around developing uh this model of personalized learning um and equipping our staff through professional learning and support to do the very best work that they're capable of doing you know within that we also place primacy on the role of performance assessment and so performance assessment is important because it is a different pathway for kids to demonstrate what they know and can do moving beyond that we named several kind of broad areas that we continue to want to reinforce and so looking to the right of this document it has been and it remains

039today our chief focus to develop the social and emotional well-being of our kids and to foster the connectedness and the skills to connect um so they can be healthy productive members of our community and so we've had over the you know last couple years lots and lots of conversation around the connectedness data the efforts to improve that work the uh you know work and the training around ruler so all of those pieces continue to be in play today um you know again very broadly you know we also have been you know refining our practices around using the principles of um universal design and you know when i think about kind of where we are in terms of this pandemic environment you know one of the the gifts that we've been given is the opportunity to

040utilize digital platforms which are really um enabling us to you know further you know meet the aspirations of universal design for learning and so being able to interact with kids in different ways and customize opportunities for them to access their learning you know we've really grown a ton over the last eight months uh with respect to that work um but that continues to live as a very um kind of broad strategy again you know continuing this the slow deep work of um designing and implementing performance assessments and then keeping our eyes on the ball with respect to student achievement um you know again harkening back to the development of the portrait of the graduate you know within the realm of academic skills we also talk about 21st century skills and what are those what's the

041equipment kids need to be really successful as they move beyond our schools and so um you know the cognitive development skills of you know being able to um inquire interpret communicate effectively uh etc um all of that work is layered um you know very deeply in our curriculum at this point um across the the district so we keep an eye on that um and then is it before i transition into the kind of really specific you know concrete goals for this year um i think it's important to have that broad backdrop um and just name again that we we haven't lost sight of um you know what we've laid out as our aspirational targets but i also i wanted to just take a minute i know you know you all know this because you're living

042this right alongside me but um i i just think in setting up the conversation it's important to name again you know this has been an unbelievably challenging school year and there's i don't think one thing about it that hasn't been challenging um i i saying that you know i have been able to take some stock and look backwards and i do feel very good about the plans we've developed we're seeing evidence daily of the effectiveness of those plans and those decisions so i think you know we can all celebrate that good work we also continue to walk a tightrope and um this is something you know it's going to be the next piece of the conversation you know about what model are we in and you know how do we know it's the right model

043and um you know what's going to force us to change you know to me that's a daily tightrope and that's where i spend the vast majority of my time trying to better understand that and then work with my colleagues here across the district and work with all of you to ensure that we have the evidence and the data to make really good decisions in service to our kids and families but it's i think walking a tightrope is a very apt description as you know and we talk about every time we meet the goals that you established um and i'm working to implement really place health and safety first um and you know we've honored that commitment with each decision we've made around our learning models and the adaptations we've been forced to make as we

044continue to do that we also know that we have competing perspectives and competing demands and those competing demands are amplified in this environment but we we come together and we work through it um you know i think thinking about all of this um as you know we've gone into this part of the year um it's helpful to step back and identify the reality that our teachers and our students are settling into an entirely new instructional routine you know for us in a k-12 school system um this notion of of hybrid learning really didn't exist for us um and so you know we're in the middle of it we are refining it i heard joy told me a great story today about a colleague over at middlebrook who um you know dory well he's using multiple

045cameras in his classroom now and um really you know again just trying to provide this really rich experience for his kids and so um you know we weren't even thinking about that you know 10 11 months ago and so you know to look at how far we've come and to look at the way you know so many of our staff members are adapting and innovating and trying to make the experience as rich as we can knowing that it's brand new is really inspiring and so you know i look at examples like that i look at the decisions we're making i look at the um the data that we have and you know it just leads me to this understanding that you know we really are as a school district um you know under your leadership

046as a board we are effectively managing in this pandemic environment and i don't think that's a small thing i think we can really um we can celebrate that um you know as glenn was just describing um we've had you know comparatively um fairly low transmission numbers you know i was monitoring across the region and was under the impression that ours had been um you know until recently among the lowest they may still be i haven't checked in a while but again i just think it speaks to um this partnership in collaboration with the town um the work and the direction you know provided by uh barry vogel uh and chrissy matkin um and then you know our capacity to respond as we learn of cases and contact trace and require quarantining so to me all

047of that is very good as you know a few weeks ago you know unfortunately given what was happening at center mill um that school had to transition to full remote learning um today we transitioned back on both ends the transition was seamless um and you look at that and you know again to me it's it's great evidence that the models that we um plan for and that we implemented and then adapted um are working very very well and so you know instruction wasn't interrupted um the kids you know picked up today where they left off yesterday and um you know when they had to transition to full remote learning there really wasn't any kind of disruption to the learning and so when you step back from that and you think about what we're trying to

048accomplish and in the midst of this crazy time the fact that we're able to really ensure a continuity of learning um that's a major accomplishment so i'm really happy to see how well that's unfolded because when we were first planning you know truly it was all new we had no idea uh so all of that being said you know nothing um is perfect anywhere you know and we are still in this you know mode of discovery and adaption so you know we need to continue to look at you know some of those pinch points um one of the pinch point areas that we have is with the um remote learning model at miller driscoll we've gotten you know a number of questions not an overwhelming number but a number of questions about the sizes of

049those groups and you know the extent to which teachers are able to effectively um work with those kids in those models and the challenges that we face in terms of managing uh the temporary remote learners because the model is so different so we have to continue and we are you know focusing on that we'll talk about that a little bit more later here in the evening we need to continue to refine the hybrid instructional model um and then you know as kind of going back to where i started we really need to continue to ensure that we're connecting and engaging with all students and you know not only focusing on their social and emotional well-being but also really targeting the learning gaps and working to close those um you know this is just a as

050i was putting this together um you know you know some of the successes um but i think it's just worth looking at for a second so you know the amount of planning that we did from april to august i think is paying off um we have you know three different models um and we've seen evidence of being able to transition effectively through those models um at most of our schools the again contact tracing which you know if you'd asked us what that was back in january or february i don't know that anyone would have able to define it but we have i think very good robust and efficient contact tracing protocols the people on this call with you spend a lot of their days many days and have over the last two months engaged in

051that work and so that's brand new work for our school administrators but they do it they do it well and they do it at all times of the day and night um all week long and so you know it's important to name that as well um and you know again thinking about just the the pandemic response um you know we've designed school spaces implemented procedures protocols um all with the intention of promoting the health and safety of our students and staff and i think you know as debbie and glenn pointed out the numbers are revealing you know evidence of the effectiveness of that work you know we've instructed new instructional models we've adapted new technology we are you know have a really i think living with a clear understanding that the environment is fluid and

052so you know we're responding accordingly um and that's you know again just thinking about how traditionally how school systems have operated you know the the need to be flexible food and adaptable um you know was something i think we aspire to years ago but we live it today out of necessity um we've had to improve our communications and um you know we have almost a nightly at this point um with respect to covet but um we've gotten you know some good feedback about um you know the quality of the communication the routine of the communication and so that's been a very good outcome so far as well um and then thinking about our kids you know again even in this environment we have been able to serve them you know both instructionally in the classrooms

053but we've also you know through the creativity and ingenuity of our staff and parents we've been able to provide other opportunities as well and so we have you know virtual clubs and activities running we were able to host a virtual fall play this year and uh remarkably we completed a fall sports season so yeah all of those things i think um speak to uh just you know some the tremendous effort made by so many of the folks here in the wilton public schools um so all of that's my preamble um you know so what is it that we continue to focus on this year um as you know for years we've tried to categorize goals into four broad goal areas so one is whole child the second is student outcomes a third is physical accountability

054and then the fourth is teaching and learning and in this year we've added a fifth the pandemic response so um for this year what we're focusing on really under that kind of umbrella of whole child is the mental health and well-being of students and really ensuring the to the extent that we are able to um that our kids are feeling connected and engaged with our school community having the tragedies we had at the high school having a student commit suicide really calls to the fore the importance of those community connections and so um that is for you know very good and obvious reasons um a major focal point for us it has been and will continue to be as we move forward related to that is um you know the need to focus on um

055you know those community members who are trauma impacted and you know people respond to trauma in different ways but in thinking about how you know we create safe environments and help students be more available for learning we also have to have supports and people and programs in place to help individuals whether they're adults or kids um be able to effectively process that trauma and work through it and so you know we're paying attention to that with respect to student outcomes those are really academic outcomes and um you know it has been our focus and continues to be our focus um in the areas of um literacy and mathematics um specifically you know in literacy we're really you know targeting some of the good work that's underway and enhancing that work and our early childhood grades

056and so with early reading and you know specifically around the development of phonics and phonemic awareness and the implementation of some new diagnostic tools to help us you know better understand where kids are and you know what gaps they might have so we can respond and ensure that all of our kids are coming out of uh miller driscoll and starter mill um being you know really strong proficient readers and then in the area of mathematics um that's a conversation you know two we've had you know very recently um and you know when we compare our reading and math achievement you know this um our math achievement lags and so we've got you know lots of pieces in play here to improve our student math achievement but you know thinking specifically about this year um chuck

057and his team would truly you know continue to work on that and we have a you know a couple of programs we'll be coming forward with to propose um and really targeting you know specific um enhanced supports for um you know some of our kids to ensure that you know as they move uh on a middle brook and into high school they really are you know ready for those upper-level math classes under the topic of fiscal accountability um you know when i'm not worrying about the pandemic i'm worrying about the budget and so um one of our my chief responsibilities uh and we have good people around it is to manage our 2021 budget and try to limit cost overruns i think we have a good team and a good set of processes in place

058and we've had you know good you know budget and fiscal discipline um over time this year is extraordinary because um you know it's the first and you know kind of my career where um we've had these extraordinary unbudgeted expenditures and so we are we're carrying um an overrun we've you know planned for that early on you know with the cooperation of the town and the board of finance um and so we'll manage it but um you know things can you know get away from us pretty easily if we're not paying attention and so um you know we're paying very close attention to our budget um i know you know and lens is shaking every tree she can find um to try to get the reimbursements um that we're entitled to and you know we're all

059you know kind of waiting with baited breath hoping that the federal government and fema will follow through on some of its their early commitments to provide um the support not only to our school district but to so many others across the country because we're all you know sitting similarly in the expenditures we've had to make to respond to the copic pandemic so managing the budget this year and making sure that we close out the year in the best position possible is a chief area focus um you know as part of that you know we continue to partner in dialogue with um you know both um the selectmen and first like women vanderslice as well as the board of finance um and they've been you know good partners and they certainly understand uh the need and

060the situation we find ourselves in so um you know we continue to partner with them um and then you know kind of the last big piece under fiscal accountability in addition to managing this budget we're also well into planning the um the next budget the budget for fiscal 22 and so you know we're looking to you know based on the feedback we got from the board of finance we're looking to manage our needs and you know come forward with a budget that's somewhere between being relatively flat to no more than three percent as an increase and so those numbers are still very preliminary at this point we're in budget development but kind of given where we are and what we're planning i feel confident that you know we'll be able to achieve that goal and

061then the last piece here in terms of teaching and learning um you know as i said a moment ago um our kids and teachers are you know operationalizing a brand new instructional model and so um you know we need to continue to support them in every way we're able to uh with respect to their instructional practice in the splendid environment um and so you know friends worked last night as an example um we'll continue to do that um and working through the administrators and our uh coaches and you know technology specialists um you know we're gonna we're committed to providing um as much support as we can to help them be as successful as they can in that model and then the last piece um you know not news to anybody but you know we

062we've had an eye on our efforts to promote diversity inclusion and equity and you know we're taking you know small but really important steps forward every single day on that work and you know we continue to have that as an area of focus this year i'll stop um i know that's a word salad that you've all heard from me um but i did you know break these down into individual pieces so if it's helpful um i can you know just advance through a couple of slides and give you a little more detail or i'm happy to just stop talking for a minute and take some questions or some feedback if you have it okay any questions or comments yeah kevin uh i i think that this is all well and good and i i really

063think in the light of the current situation you you guys have really done a remarkable job but as i listen to you i the thought comes to my mind we talk in particular it relates to the whole child what about the whole teacher you know we get emails on a fairly regular basis from a number of teachers who are distraught who are troubled who have great fear about the whole cove situation the task they're given and i would challenge you to think about what we do or is there a way to address and and focus somewhat at some point and in some manner on our teachers to help them as they struggle through the same thing that our students are struggling through and i don't see that here i guess that i did i just

064put that forward to you as something to think about and maybe get back to us with uh because i think we have a number of teachers out there who are really struggling the same way our students are struggling and i think we should try and develop some way of helping them okay that's it i appreciate that and so i would just say you know kind of initially as a you know first response you know the the fact that i didn't name you know the whole teacher or um you know the teachers um doesn't suggest that you know we don't have uh quite a bit underway sure listen i i'm absolutely sure about that and i just bring it up as a point uh not to lose the focus not to lose that as part of

065our process and what we're trying to do to help everyone not only our students but our teachers who are struggling too okay yeah really do appreciate that comment glenn and um and and we know and i think you know both you know within um each of the individual buildings you know through the administrators and others there are good um you know support networks but you know i would also say um you know at the district level you know the work that maria is doing um her team uh is absolutely um you know i'm just critical in trying to you know help him work with teachers and you know the example i would offer to you is um you know the approach that we've taken you know we've had a lot of folks um whether they're

066you know teachers or other um come forward and as you just described to express a lot of concern about you know coming to school and working in the environment um and there are lots of you know other um challenges that you know have been present in their lives being pandemic and so you know we've been um you know challenged about how to you know best support so many different people but the tech that we've taken is to you know kind of one you know be open to individuals um unique circumstances and you know try to avoid you know you know blanket responses where we can avoid those and and work with individuals to try to you know help them manage their own needs um so that they can um you know do their job and

067you know feel good about doing it and so you know i think the accommodations that you know we've been making for people is as appropriate with uh relation to um remote work is one example um okay i i would just like to see that as part of your objectives yeah it's you know specified as as part of this presentation that our teachers are also vitally important to us and they are at the core of what we do uh and we need to be respon and and i'm not saying that we're not at all please don't get me wrong but it's just i think we need to highlight and and make it part of what we're about okay so um perhaps just um verbalize it you know make it you know just uh uh you know

068i think you can put into words all the efforts that have been going on to support staff um you know and and help everyone through this um environment so you know just let's just make it more public perhaps or more visible yeah i in fact that that would be great it's just to let them know that we care and let them know that we're here for the you know and i not that we aren't and don't get me wrong i'm not saying that at all but i have yeah yeah i think along the way there's been tremendous effort you know the same thing around obviously the students um but i just think we need to you know list it the same way you have um on some of these other slides yeah kevin we could

069there's been i think there's been a tremendous amount of effort between the hr department and um working with the faculty and being as responsive as possible with schedule and staff development and all of that so we just need to um just summarize it perhaps you got it okay great thank you for that get other questions comments feedback no i think this reminds us that while much of what we're doing this year is you know in relation to or driven by covid that it's still the the student uh learning at the center of it learning and development um and so i think it's great to sort of you know remind us that you know the district is is doing its you know it's vital mission um while you know or in the midst of a pandemic

070and um it's been challenging yes and struggles yes but there's also been a tremendous amount of good news and even some open doors um as someone who has been in education forever the idea about flexibility and adaptability uh kevin i liked it when you said it's something we've always aspired to um and if you had said you know we're gonna make all these changes in you know eight months you know in a normal world everybody would have said yeah right um so you know we have done it and so i i just think that that's a tremendous takeaway um and you know for as much as we do not like or want to ever keep hybrid learning you know as our major mode of instruction i think there will be times in the future for

071some kids and some situations where it may prove to be a help um you know for kids who are having access issues in a traditional way they may have challenges there but we've opened some doors for how to access learning in slightly different ways and i think that that will pay off in the long run um perhaps in ways we don't yet know so then i think you know just um what what i'll do i'll just i'll send you um the detailed slides here and then you know you can look at them and um you know what what i've done is just you know kind of restated the you know the goal areas and just described okay yeah and we we did such a a good thorough uh math workshop and then i know that

072we sent in some follow-up questions to the math and i know chuck and his team were working on getting us you know sort of um you know all sorts some of the data that we had asked as follow-up to the workshop um so i think if we could highlight that as well and you probably have um in some of these later slides but let's not lose sight of the math work and the sooner you can bring us your proposals to support this year's math work the better sure yeah you have that you know we were talking about you know when to target the the next math workshop because we had some you know some work that we wanted to finish from the previous one but also um you know get into the weeds about those

073responses so um we had originally when chuck and i were talking about this um either at the end of last week earlier this week as a follow-up opportunity you know somewhere in the very early part of the january but i think you know just understanding that the need to put some proposals in front of you perhaps we can send you some proposals in advance of that and then we'll target a workshop for um you know the first or second week of january and then you'll have those in advance and we can kind of dive right into um just you know the questions that you'll have as you're following up with those right now you you had um you know some very preliminary ideas about providing um support for math uh so the sooner i i

074think you just said it but the sooner we could we could see that the better um i know that everyone's been reading you know sort of national research about um student achievement during this kind of pandemic year and that some of the national reports not not wilton specific but you know sort of more global statements show that math is a vulnerable area in this environment yeah that's exactly right there was a really provocative article in education week this week on that topic yeah i mean i think it would be great if we could get some proposals in advance of the meeting so then when it comes time to the meeting we're kind of looking at the proposals themselves and being able to you know sort through what we can what we think are um together

075is the best way to move forward so we can move forward within short order after that and not you know still have a couple you know more work to do and then follow up and then perhaps implement and then your slide in the towards the beginning on the um a pandemic and sort of looking forward to the remote learning model at miller driscoll etc i would just like to and again i don't want to push but i don't want to close this off to the idea of looking for continue to look for ways to augment the um you know live instructional opportunities whether it's if and when the numbers come down um you know we had talked very earl you know earlier on about would it be possible to start bringing middle brook back more

076um you know we just we want to always keep that possibility there as soon as you know health and safety allow and we've talked about are there alternate uses of wednesdays uh so let's not lose sight of you know sort of augmenting as much live instructional opportunity as there may exist this year sure of course i'm you know more specific information and feedback that i was saving for the learning model update portion here but yeah those are front and center as well thanks okay so is it time to move to the learning model update then do you think any other um any other comments on okay so let's move to that great um you're going to be sick of hearing my voice all right so just um kind of in keeping with recent tradition here

077um i'll just share with you uh first kind of where we are as a community in terms of uh coveted numbers uh so you know as you know we um pay close attention to the kodak now website and then each thursday about four o'clock the state department of public health updates its own information the kovadak now information is a little more dynamic the state department of public health generally lags two weeks so as of this afternoon on the copenhag now website the average daily new case rate for fairfield county is 56.6 um so that's you know fairly extraordinary the infection rate is 1.04 and the positive test rate is uh 10.9 percent um those numbers had they they're had increased uh from a couple weeks ago and you know just tracking them over the last

078several days there was a you know pretty substantial spike they were above 60 for a few days and then they had dropped into the you know mid-40s over the last several days and now they're you know trending north again um and so if they're in the mid 50s earlier today the connecticut state department of public health um reported for fairfield county an average uh daily new case rate of 52.5 um that's up from 49.3 two weeks ago when last we spoke about it the percent test positivity is eight percent that was up from five point nine percent two weeks ago um the data from wilton um is um in terms of uh daily new case rates 27.6 that's actually trended down from the last report which was 31.8 two weeks ago um so in talking

079with barry about that you know he was just as he kind of tracks numbers um what he had suggested was you know we are going to see um you know a short decline you know for the next couple of days but then he's um expecting an uptick again as we see the results of you know people's travel activities coming home in terms of our current school district numbers um right now we have um six staff members across the district who are covered positive and they're currently isolating uh four from the high school ones from middlebrook uh one's a district level staff member we have five students who are currently uh confirmed coveted positive and are isolating ones at middlebrook one's at sargerail um three at miller driscoll in terms of staff who are quarantining because

080of their close contact we have a total of 32 across the district so at the high school there's 13. middlebrook is we have four three at cider mill and a dozen at miller driscoll and then in terms of the numbers of students who are currently quarantining uh we have a total of 83 students who were quarantining 23 from the high school seven from middlebrook uh four from sega mill and then 49 from miller driscoll um all those numbers uh you can find on our website we're updating this uh covet tracker now from daily um so a couple weeks ago on november 18th you know we were at um you know 206 students uh quarantining and uh 52 staff and we had you know 16 students confirmed positive and three adults at that time so um

081you know the numbers are you know definitely in you know the more recent days are moving in the right direction so we feel pretty encouraged about that um in speaking with um both uh chrissy and barry um the consensus recommendation is that we you know keep our current models um in place through at least um the new year and so um you know that would mean both miller driscoll and uh cider mill you know we continue the in-person model of having them come in four days a week the middle school and high school we keep on hybrid and then wednesdays for that same time period we keep remote and so you know in that conversation um you know they both concurred that all of the strategies we're using seem to be effective including the remote

082wednesday and so you know we're not seeing um lots of cases of um in school transmission and um you know so that leads us to trying to keep these models in place and keep our kids in school as much as we're able what else do i want to tell you about that you know i think just as you know and uh you know probably you know bears repeating um you know the situation is it's dynamic it's fluid and you know it can change hour to hour so um you know we should continue to be prepared to shift models uh in a moment's notice if necessary with the respect to the the recommendation um about wednesdays um you know that remote day is you know part of our collection of mitigation strategies and as i've reported

083to you um previously you know jose figueroa and our custodial staff place of a lot of importance on um having that day to do additional cleaning you know as well we've talked about the um opportunity to have the air turnover um you know throughout the day when no one's in the building um so you know jose hasn't moved on that he does think at this point it's um it's worth holding on to and uh christine barry certainly concur for the time being um you know i think the other that the challenge you know that we and so many other communities face here too in uh managing our models is having enough in-person staff to effectively deliver instruction and so we do see you know in that regard um the wednesday remote days is beneficial too

084because we do have staff who are quarantining and uh teaching from home and so on those days when we're working remotely you know we're not scrambling to try to provide in-person coverage um so we can have an adult in the room where you know the adults the the teachers might not be present so there are a number of benefits um you know staff absences are a challenge um you know we continue you know not only are we impacted by our local quarantines but you know we're also impacted by issues that um occur in neighboring towns and so you know most recently um a number of towns you know to the north and north uh east of us um have transitioned from you know whatever model they were into full remote learning and we have a

085number of folks who live in those communities and whose children attend those schools and so you know we have a fair number of folks who have been you know hard-pressed to find child care and have had to take days so they can care for their own kids because um the in-person schooling hasn't been available and so you take that piece you take quarantining we also have you know as we've advised staff members who are airing on side of caution and taking sick days because they don't want to run the risk of infecting others so you know we have a fair number of staff out every single day and you know today we've been able to cover it and you know we continue to hope that we're able to cover it but um it is one

086of those variables um that we look at you know carefully you know every night before we go to bed and every morning as we get up and um you know there are we have you know secretaries into the building who are working magic to um make those coverages available so we can continue to uh keep our buildings open um but that's if i think if anything is gonna you know force us to remote in a school building it's gonna be a shortage of staff before it's any kind of you know in school copic transmission so you know just thinking forward um you know is i think it's important we um we take the advice of chris and barry and um you know we just you know commit to having these models in place through the

087remainder of december and then you know we examine the first week of january and you know we kind of follow our process we look at um you know what our numbers look like um and you know we make a decision at that time um you know going back to you know debbie the the question or comment you made about middlebrook you know we have been working to set that school up so we can welcome kids back to that school and so um at this point all of the sixth and seventh grade classrooms are outfitted with ample furniture so you know we could bring those kids back we're still short on some furniture in the eighth grade i was hoping that you know we could configure you know enough of the different size tables we have

088to be able to use that furniture to accommodate the eighth grade but you know the geometry and the space limitations just don't line up in our favor so we have to get some more depths for the eighth grade classroom but we'll have those in place in the very early part of january so if we find ourselves in a position where we can bring more students back at that school we'll be ready to do it um and so i think you know that's something you know jerry's joey's gonna have to you know work with the staff and make sure that the staff is all prepared but i'm sure that you know this is a possibility people have been thinking about for some time in terms of you know how we go about that i think you

089know first we'll continue to watch the numbers um listen to the advice of our medical advisors and you know if we get the the all clear um you know we would move as quickly as we can to you know bring students back and you know what i'm imagining is you know probably not dissimilar to the way we repopulated cider mill but you know we do uh over a very short period of time maybe you know a week or four days but we do it you know a phased return so you know start with sixth grade um on a given day they come back you know the next day seventh grade you know perhaps the next day eighth grade so um we do have i think um a good plan in place and um like i

090said by early january the entire building will be ready to go and so we we should be able to achieve that if the corporate data lines up to support it the high school is a different story altogether um and just the logistics um do not support um at this point getting all of the kids back in the building together simultaneously uh given the um the space restrictions we have as well as the schedule that we're operating under so um i don't i wouldn't have the same recommendation for the high school um at the early part of the year even if the copic numbers changed but what i've asked bob and don and their staff to do is to you know continue to look at some different opportunities so you know can we get in a

091single grade can we get in two grades um you know is there a schedule shift that we should explore to accommodate more kids um but i think you know there when you're talking about a full return at that school um we have to weigh differently the benefits and the drawbacks of of doing that so you know at this point um i it wouldn't be my first recommendation but um i think as we kind of move forward in time here we can have some good thinking about again if that if the numbers permit how we um you know bring some more students back and which students we would be able to bring back and then the last piece is uh just on the wednesdays you know and again um i would just say you know right

092now this strategy um seems to work and it's effective in the environment that we're in but you know if the environment changes um if numbers come down then i think you know we'd all be poised to re-evaluate that and then um just again weigh out the the benefit versus the drawback and um if it really made sense to try to bring kids in in some fashion on that day then we would certainly take advantage of that kevin i think that makes sense i i really do i i think you we we've been fortunate so far and to see the course that we're on although it's not ideal uh it does make sense to stay this way at least through december and look at it again come january and maybe mid january after we get through

093the holiday you know output whatever it's going to happen over the holidays uh but i think we're okay i i look we would all love to have all the kids back no doubt about it but it just doesn't make sense to try and do it at this point so i think you're on the right track and i would support that say the course it's working for us uh it's not ideal but uh our our teachers every day become more and more accustomed to what we're doing and how we're doing it and what they need to do uh so let's just you know stay stay where we are right now i think you're right i i agree wholeheartedly okay any other questions or comments there are two other pieces that i wanted to just raise as

094part of um but i'll i'll wait unless there are other questions or comments or feedback about you know everything i presented well i think it's great um that should the numbers change and should the medical advice change that middlebrook is ready you know not not quite sure what furniture you need but i'm hoping that's not a huge obstacle but so i think that's great in terms of the planning is there um you know what you need to do and you could do it in short order uh if the numbers and the medical advice come in differently than they are now i think we were all expecting you know given all the national news and the state news that staying the course right now you know through the holidays is is the sensible um safe health

095you know most healthful approach to take so thanks again and also thank you for planning ahead and looking at middlebrook and maybe keeping the door open a little bit about wednesdays um you know just you know if the high school is not able to affect a full open that you know can we grab some time perhaps not right away but at some point from wednesday no it's a good point any other any other comments or questions on those pieces okay so just you know briefly um so today we welcomed the um kids at senator mill and uh after two weeks of remote learning um and you know i know i said it at the outset but it the transition was seamless um yeah i called over there in the middle of the day and um

096you know people were really excited to hear the voices of children in the school and you know teachers were in a very good place but from an instructional perspective um i really just think we we have to just really respect the fact that you know these folks just they transitioned they were you know in there out and they were in um and there was there was no problem um jen i want to just give you a minute to you know echo that because i really do think it's a very big deal i just i think about where we were last spring and um the amazing amount of work that bran the coordinators but our teachers and just how their ability to work in those team structures that we have and you know not only is

097it just amazing that as a school community we can go in and out but we've had whole classrooms on quarantine and you know within the team still be able to have teachers you know teaching remotely and everybody's still engaged and it's just the fluidity of having um schoology as the platform to kind of ground the learning has been amazing and i and it doesn't come without its challenges but um i just you know really want to take an opportunity to thank fran who has been the biggest cheerleader of all of this and our llc staff and our teachers because the work that they've all been putting into this has really supported our our kids being able to to do this so yeah thanks jen yeah that's great news congratulations um and the kids must have

098been so happy to be back oh my gosh yes as a mom of the third grader she was very happy teachers are happy too man it's a heck of a lot easier to teach when they're in front of you but i have to say as a mom also seeing it happen i know that the instruction that she's getting when she's at home and the instruction that she's getting in the school like when she's in the building the quality and it's just tremendous in both in both ways and in both places so teachers are amazing i just i can't say enough yeah that's great no my two fourth graders were 10 minutes early for the bus this morning that's a telling sign um so the last piece i wanted to get into under this topic was

099um really just about the um the remote learning model that's in place at milla driscoll because that's a very different approach and you know when kathy and her team set it up um you know we knew at the outset you know what the advantages were as well as what the the disadvantages would be and so you know we've received some feedback um and now it's not overwhelming by um a long shot um but there have been uh some questions raised about the numbers of kids in those classes and you know how effectively our teachers are able to manage those numbers and so as you know um you know that the model kathy put in place she's got a lead kind of classroom teacher and then you know two of the coaches are working with that

100teacher so kids come together in a larger group um they receive a mini lesson from a teacher and then they do breakout groups with the other two teachers as a way to just manage the instruction and manage the size of the classes um so that um you know the benefit of that model is you know those kids are assigned to a group of teachers and that's their group of teachers and then that the rest of the staff that's working with students in person doesn't have the added challenge of managing students remotely and you know that was you know in fairness to to kathleen what she's trying to accomplish you know early on when we were planning these models you know that's not what i was thinking about for miller driscoll but you know she was

101absolutely right to you know protect and segregate her staff that way because the needs of the our youngest learners are so different and um i don't think it would have been fair or effective um to put those teachers in the situation where they were trying to teach really critical literacy skills in a hybrid environment and so um so i support the approach i think you know our work now is to um to really continue to assess you know how effectively it's working and to be open about the challenges that some of the kids may be having and find you know good ways to you know to support those kids to make sure that they're gleaning as much as possible from the experience the related question about this model that we want to get into a

102little bit too is how do we best accommodate our temporary remote learners and so that's where you know very different from the middle school or the high school or outsider mill for that matter those kids are attached to a class and they can kind of come in and come out and the teachers can manage it because of those models different at miller driscoll and you know as we're thinking about the next couple weeks and what could um you know what we could see in terms of uh kids you know needing or parents wanting um remote learning you know this model is certainly not as amenable to those kinds of changes and so i want to just kind of have kathy kind of weigh in here a little bit because um it's important you know i

103think for the the board to understand yeah there are absolutely challenges but you know the model for many i think is working and you know kathy works very closely with those teachers and so um you know she's getting feedback from them they're certainly in touch with their parents and um you know they're obviously with the kids every day so i think they've done a lot of adjusting and refining and then kathy and her team as well have uh come up with some different approaches to try to respond and accommodate um those families who need to also temporarily quarantine so katy want to kind of start if you don't mind uh just with um your own observations you were in some of those classrooms recently and you know what did you see and you know how

104did it go and then you know kind of what's your own thinking in terms of what the next steps are for us in terms of the evolution i think first off we designed the model knowing that the number of students in the remote classes might kind of ebb and flow and so that's why we put a team of teachers in there so that's first first and foremost second is again like kevin said we've gotten some feedback but for the most part the majority of people are very happy um all of the people are very happy with the teachers and the coaches and all of the people who are doing the instruction some of the people who even had questions though about the number of students in the class um wholeheartedly agree that our model of

105a teacher teaching students who are remote only or a teacher teaching students who are on site only is the best model so even though they might have some issues with numbers or things like that they all agree that that is the best way to do it so again if you look at kind of a typical day and it does mirror as much as possible a classroom you know if if there's the classroom teacher and an instructional coach in the area of humanities one of them will teach the mini lesson to the entire group and again you have to understand a mini lesson for first grade is about seven minutes eight minutes maybe and then they do divide up into breakout rooms and into other small groups so it's very similar to what happens in a

106classroom and if you think you know first and second grade have a bigger number of students so it's you know about 30 students in both of those classes so when you divide up between the two teachers you know the ratio is you know about a teacher to 15 students i did say it'd be really great if somebody and this is a great idea for all of you out there listening if somebody could invent a tool a technological tool friend this is all you you could do this where a teacher could meet with a small group while still being able to watch what the other children are doing that would be amazing but right now we can't do it there's not a tool that would let us do that so that does mean that you have

107kids you know in a breakout room or working with partnerships or small groups and again they can check back in um so that's you know that's what the that's what the day looks like and it you know kids are kids are in and out kids get different different levels of support and even if i talk to parents you know it might be well you know kevin needs a little bit more support in writing but you know what in reading he's great i mean he can do all of those pieces so the teams are amazing at you know providing instruction and planning together as an administrative team we have meetings set up with them every two weeks we do our like remote team meetings and talk about you know things that might be challenging how we

108can support those teams especially we just you know completed parent-teacher conferences so obviously you know if you're the if you're the teacher of record and you're doing 30 conferences then we have to look at other ways to support you um so so we are looking at all of those pieces and i do talk to kevin a lot about the numbers the other thing that we did do was we had teacher volunteers um who created padlets so these are are very similar to what we used last year um so they're two-week padlets that are basically um support to the instruction that's going on you know kind of december january so some of those students who need remote instruction for just a small amount of time um have that instruction asynchronously via the padlet and then again

109because we do have remote wednesdays which has been which is phenomenal for our kids um then they can still um access their instruction with their classroom teacher their assigned classroom teacher who they know on wednesdays so we are monitoring it we do have some things in place and again we literally take it on a case-by-case basis dr cross talks to every family who requests remote instruction whether it's for you know a couple of days or a couple of weeks so you know so we're doing the best we can with the staff that we have and i do have to give a shout out to the remote teams because again they they are phenomenal they are phenomenal so happy to answer any questions if you have any or if that covers it kevin i'll just go

110back to muting so you don't see um uh the need or the wherewithal that would land you in a better place than you already are i mean it sounds amazing again the flexibility of the teachers and the creativity and the the different modes and um i think in wilton we're a bit fortunate in that we have the k2 and the three five model so we are able to kind of better target the the k2 kids and their needs are different than the grades three through five so i'm glad we went two slightly different roads there so we could best match the needs but are you seeing are you seeing something that you think you're going to need or is there something the board should be alert to well i do think it's tricky because given

111the numbers um it it also gets tricky like there is a there like kevin said with staff there is there are um repercussions based on what happens at other schools so when gen school for example went remote for two weeks then we did have some people saying well if my cider mill child is home then i would just like to keep my mill or just gold child at home right so that that had an impact on what we do i think the tricky part is even if we you know if we look at these classes and even if i said to you okay well you could give me another you could you're another teacher for first and hire another teacher for second you know unfortunately that would require splitting up this class and then these

112children would have yet another teacher um so that is the piece that we're kind of trying to avoid because i feel like the kids have made connections you know with their remote team for that grade level but you know i don't i don't have a crystal ball when it comes to covid and doing this in a global pandemic so there might be a point where if we're keeping the rest of the school open but we have a lot of parents who want their kids to be remote then we may have to look at something different and kathy the padlet solution for more of like the temporary remote needs that instruction is sufficient to keep the kids on track and not counted absent correct yeah and pick up where they left off when they come back

113into the classroom full time yeah the kids do the work and then again the teacher is always checking in too so even if the teacher is teaching on site oftentimes the teacher will you know zoom with the you know with a student who's home for a few days too on either their planning time or their lunch time or before or after school so there's frequent check-ins too kathy do you have a number in mind of what's too many kids in the remote class jen that is a really good question and a lot of people ask me that question um i i'm i i don't necessarily have a number because like i said i feel i don't know i don't know i don't have a hard and fast number i don't and again some kids go

114in and out so that gets a little bit tricky too i will tell you that the numbers overall from when we brought the kids back on site four days the numbers are very similar to where we started so again we get these kind of spikes like i said when with gen school or here and there um we get little spikes um so we were hoping the padlet would help but i don't i don't have a firm number because again i would i i do think it would be very difficult to transition these kiddos to yet again another new teacher so there are things that we need to continue to pay attention to um i think you know one is the just the the learning data that we have from our remote learners and you know

115what kind of judgments can we make with respect to um you know how well they're learning as a group compared to you know some of their in-person peers and you know if that comparison tells us anything about our our class sizes or you know the effectiveness of the instruction and then i think you know the second piece that i think is is really challenging for you know some of our kids and some of our families it's just it's about the quality of the experience you know and so you know we've heard some stories and kathy alluded to just a minute ago that you know the teachers are utilizing um breakout rooms and so you know we've got little kids who are you know doing partner reading and so they go into a breakout room and

116you know those are like emergent skills and so um you know as a parent if you're kind of watching that happen on you know on the home side and you know the kids aren't you know fully engaged talking to each other they've gone through the exercise quickly um you can you know i think legitimately you know question the value of that time um you know i think what's not seen is you know we are teaching the same skills um in our classrooms and so when kids are doing partner reading you know the only difference is they're in a classroom with a teacher and um you know the teacher is observing so you know the medium absolutely impacts the quality and so i think this is where you know the last time we met you know

117i was you know just you know we need to continue to dialogue with our kids and with our parents about the quality of the experience and so you know between the learning data between the feedback we get about the quality experience we just have to be open to um you know to continuing to adjust and so you know i do have a worry that you know some of our parents um and maybe some of the kids feel like they're you know second-class citizens and you know that's was never the intention it's not the intention it's it's not the goal we're trying to make the um make the experience as robust as we can given the limitations we have and so is you know i think as long as we continue to focus on that and

118and you know people are open to you know providing feedback and you know we stay committed to you know ensuring a quality of experience it'll it'll continue to get better over time as as the kids mature into it and um you know as our teachers learn more i will say too there's one other thing that you that you cannot replicate in remote instruction um which is kids being able to watch other kids so we teach kids you know if the teacher gives a direction and then you're kind of not really sure what to do it's like oh what are your friends doing um and they don't have those cues so i do think you know especially for little kids that's something that is really really tricky um because they do pick up a lot on

119you know oh let me see what my peers are doing if maybe i missed you know one of the the one one part of that three-part direction or something um so that is something again that is very hard to replicate um via remote instructions probably doesn't matter how old you are or what you're doing so it's tricky have you had any requests from people who signed up for a full remote to perhaps move back to on-site yup are there any numbers floated that way um we've had a couple kids that have come back and then i think right now we have three that are pending i think some people are waiting for the you know for january um because it's so close to the um to the holiday um to the vacation so we have

120some people though who are considering like i said i think we have three families right now who are considering coming back in january which is fantastic okay good okay and just have we considered or is there a way to perhaps maybe just provide some additional support during the breakout room times so it's kind of like there's another perhaps like set of adult eyes so to speak but not the same as having an additional teeth you know splitting it up and having an additional teacher yep dr smith and i talked about that actually this morning because i said you know perhaps a paraprofessional or something but again we have to look at the staff that we have we do have you know we have paraprofessionals that are assigned based on special education mandates um and so

121whether there's any flexibility there we will look at it we do have regular ed paris but they are assigned to kindergarten and we only have five this year and we have 13 kindergarten classes um so again one is remote but spreading five across uh 12 classes especially when the kids can't move around and it's harder to pull small groups um it's just super tricky so i hear you and we're looking at everybody's time and we may be able to even do a little something different especially on wednesdays but it but it is it is tricky okay okay okay [Music] all right anything else on the learning model update andrea could you just give us and i really mean it when i say one or two minutes but i just want to check in with the

122students receiving special services and how you think that's going as always in special education we have kids who are knocking it out of the park and kids who are struggling um teams are working with all of them to make sure that they continue to creatively solve the problems as they exist whether they be problems in remote learning or problems um in the return to school and kids who are coming to school um so i think all in all the department is working um extraordinarily well the teachers are teachers and related service people and paraprofessionals and in administration they're working very hard with each and every individual kid individual student and learner to make sure that their needs are being met and and never giving up if there's a struggle going on which is similar um

123to a regular year a non-pandemic year the four day students who are coming four days a week those who've chosen to do that they're doing very well they're engaged their teams are working very well with them um the collaborative center students from cider mill who stayed in during the two-week shutdown who came um that was a great benefit to those students who are more challenged in the remote learning environment so they did their um they had continuity of care and continuity of learning and i think that went very well um and so you know genesis continues to uh move in and out genesis was they were fully remote for for a little bit too due to a positive case as well but they're back and doing extraordinary work you know and the kids and teachers

124are working very strongly together uh in that environment right now we have our community steps our 18 to 21 program they are currently um quarantining due to a positive case um so um the community steps program is more challenging because obviously community learning is is really quite limited right now um so we've found a million ways we have a group of kids doing projects at um at miller driscoll um they're working with the miller driscoll team to do some much needed organizational work and getting some hands-on experience work experience that way so the team is being very creative to try to build vocational experiences and pre-vocational experiences um even in this time when the students can't go out into the community as freely as they would normally so you know the story is much the

125same with everyone else it's a lesson in cognitive flexibility it's a lesson in um you know meeting the students and families where they are trying to solve real problems one at a time in real time and trying to do so while continuing to build and maintain positive relationships with our students and their families okay thank you um just could i i have a quick question and andrea the students that are outplaced what uh contact or what do we know about what their schools and where they are are doing and are we monitoring that in any way shape or form yes uh we monitor all of our each of our students who is placed out of district has an in-district case manager um and then sharon and melissa sharon d'angelo melissa barrett and myself we work

126with the private schools we get information when they go into hybrid or someone needs to be quarantined so we get that information from those schools and we monitor what's happening we also have some of those students whose parents have chosen to be fully remote similar to what we just talked about at miller driscoll so we have we have a number of different iterations going on with our kids who are in out placements okay thank you thanks thanks andrea um just one more question about are we what about the identification process um is that changed this year are we seeing do we know how to do it are we seeing more students fewer students about the same number of students we do know how to do it and we're continuing to work that one of the

127challenges is of new referrals right now when we have people in and out in quarantine is meeting our our evaluation timelines and doing quality evaluations within that but our teams are working very hard we all we've all developed plans for how to manage the evaluation needs of students even if we have if the students have to go to a full remote model and how we're going to do that so each school has developed a plan to manage that in the event that their school has to go to full remote and we can continue to evaluate students um right now this is the time of year where we start to see a a dramatic uptick in new referrals to special education and it happens across the board from miller driscoll all the way through the high

128school whether it's typically it's the first round of report cards that may play a role uh maybe math testing that raises a level of concern some of the progress monitoring tools reveal some data or our interventionists who've been working with students over a period of time are starting to wave the flag that this might be a disability that needs further evaluation so we're seeing that um i uh what we're not seeing right now is a a major uptick that i would term as covid related right now um but that that still could present itself over the coming months um where we see students who aren't you know who are starting to fall further behind and who may have a disability and underlying disability that needs to be evaluated and addressed but right now i think

129things are i would term them within normal limits right now um but we're watching that very carefully and keeping an eye on the data to see where we are all right thank you you're welcome kevin anything else on the learning model no not on this topic uh any further thank you okay thanks um the last item on the agenda are the 2122 district goals um kevin i don't know i'm just looking at our time do you feel comfortable starting that tonight or um what do you think i'll give you uh just a brief synopsis here let me okay perfect um and i'll do this in you know four minutes or less not just for the sake of everybody's attention so you know thinking forward um you know we're we're optimistic about what the future holds

130certainly the news with the um viru of the vaccines um are very encouraging and so we're hoping that you know at some point over the course of the next school year you know we'll return to um you know quote unquote more normal operations so in thinking about broad goals what's you know reflected on the screen in front of you are some of our longer standing continuous improvement goals so here's what i would say and as we get further into the budget process and as you um you know receive the budget and start to unpack it you'll see echoes of you know some of these continuous improvement uh initiatives um reflected in the financial plan you know but i think you know first you know just looking at the on the bottom of the screen going

131very back to the kind of the place where we started we want to be able to you know leverage some of the lessons from the pandemic and so um you know we know that when we were in you know kind of you know traditional schooling um the in-person um you know six and a half hour day didn't work well for every kid so we wanted um you know make sure that we have opportunities to better uh respond to those kids where our um our more traditional structures didn't work and i think you know we've had some good experience this year with the tools we have that we can serve those kids better and so um as a goal area you know we're we're not going to lose sight of that at all in fact you

132know chuck uh friend and i have a conversation coming up with marie alcock who you've all met she's been working overseas and you know she has a lot of lessons to offer us about school districts who are in front of us around the globe in terms of you know where they are with pandemic recovery um you know have made substantial changes to the way they do business and so there's a lot that we can glean from those places so we're anxious to talk to her about that um and then you know just some other kind of top-line areas um you know again as part of our effort um you know to improve our practices around diversity equity inclusion you know we um have a minority teacher recruitment plan in place you know we're looking to

133really um refine that plan and improve and you know consequently uh continue to diversify our staff um reading across you know teaching and learning and special services um you know we're also mindful of the fact that um you know we're not clear on you know where kids will be you know by the end of this year and so um needing to attend to further learning recovery um so if that's you know kind of picking up on the math plans that you'll be seeing about providing supplemental uh support and you know more enhanced intervention services for kids beyond the school day there'll be real financial implications there so um that's something that you know will be you know one of our goal areas um looking forward um certainly um as andrew was just describing um continuing

134to really focus on and supporting our kids with complex needs in those families and you know supporting them academically that remains a clear and important goal as we look forward um and then you know two as i discussed even about this year um really making sure that we have um the appropriate pieces in place to um respond to you know what i would describe as post-pandemic um sel needs so you know kids who are still in trauma recovery or families who are drama recovery we need to have you know personnel supports in place to be able to um respond because you know at this point we're just not clear what we're going to see so um we need to have provisions in place to do that and then um you know the rest of you

135know what you're seeing um many of those are some of our continuous improvement goals that you know we had started to work on and were sidetracked because of the pandemic and so you know it's our hope that we'll be able to pick those up again and continue to just uh you know advance the ball in terms of the broad work but um you know there are other more specific um you know academic goals that will continue to emerge and develop i think broadly um you know and i'll send this to so you have it and you can look at it more carefully but um in thinking about you know the financial plan um you know there'll be strong echoes of you know some of this work inside that plan right yeah that would be great

136if you could send that to us because i think as we try to build the budget or you know justify the budget that we have to have the underpinning of the goals really clear and i personally like to sort of decide what our goals are and then build the resources that we need to support those goals so if you could send us that draft and then we can send you questions or suggestions um one i have that probably would have some financial implications i didn't see facilities up there so i don't know if there's a place to put it but perhaps we could think about that a little bit um and we'll we can all send comments and questions for for the next meeting okay great yeah kevin i think that what 24 slides in

137that deck and you'll get that out to us that we can you know okay the first one yeah okay all right and then we should um comment and make suggestions on the 21 22 district goals because again strategically as we move forward uh you know when as we build the the resources around it in terms of the budget we have to be satisfied that we've set our right targets all right any other questions or comments for the goals um okay so our action items are to approve a recommended a couple of the new policies that we have reviewed the last meeting policy 61 62.51 student surveys are there any comments or questions about that i i think it was interesting that was the front page uh one of the front page articles today in the

138wilton bulletin so the community is well aware of what we're trying to do and i think it's very positive a very very good thing uh and their coverage was was was pretty good of what we're what we're working on so it's good right i think this is a more global policy just in general of surveys um but it's a good reminder glenn that um do we we do need to approve that official i mean that specific student screening device that was proposed by kim i don't think we ever um approved it i thought we approved it okay i'll have to check i thought that right there yeah i i thought we did maybe not but i thought we did well we heard the presentation i just don't remember approving it though okay i don't think

139we did okay okay i'll make sure to prove it yeah so let's make sure that gets on our agenda next week and i thought maybe we just needed the global student survey policy first uh just to allow us to bring it forward um so anyway let's get back to the the global policy um is there a motion for this one to approve it i move to approve do i need to give you the actual number um 61 62.51 61 52.51 62. yes is there a second second thanks gretchen all in favor aye aye any opposed all right that's approved and the next policy is policy 6154 on homework any questions comments if i'm before you vote there was a question uh that came up last week about um the inclusion of time for reading as

140part of that homework time allotment and so chuck and i went back and um talked about that and so we did adjust the regulation to um note that um reading is included in that time allotment thanks any other questions comments all right um we anybody want to uh make a motion some of to approve policy 6154 thanks glenn um is there a second second thanks ruth all in favor any opposed all right that is approved all right we have our future um calendar of meetings and again special meetings is um can be added if kevin feels the need lucille any more comments from the public there aren't any all right okay so thank you everyone um and congratulations to cider mill for getting uh back to uh more normal and thanks as usual for everyone's

141hard work so thank you and uh we'll see you in a couple of weeks so thank you and this meeting's adjourned good night good night everyone good night you